With the current job market in absolute and utter disarray, where the unemployment rate is now 7.8%- 2.47 million, things aren’t looking too shiny.
But a crack of light is beaming through the masses of job applications, dole forms and crowds of disheartened job seekers. And that golden crack is the finance industry, which actually wants to hire graduates and junior level executives to fill permanent positions. According to Robert Half CFO Confidence Index over two-thirds of financial heads want the best of our country’s Generation Y to be the next batch of financial head honchos.
'We're Gen Y and we are in fact virtual' by Debe Maxwell, Charlotte NC Real Estate
The chief financial officers who were surveyed deemed Generation Y graduates as the way forward for the industry. They felt that because Gen Y are younger they’ll be more adaptable to changing markets, so will therefore be more commercially susceptible, which is something the financial sector is crying out for after the mess we’ve been left in.
Which leads me to ask-on a brief tangent-if Generation Y are people born from the 1980s to the 1990s and Generation X are people born during the 1960s and 1970s, then what do we call the people who were born before that?
Generation W? Which I suppose would make sense, but that’s kind of easy…and dull. Generation Baby Boom? Generation Veteran? Whatever you choose to call it, the people who are making the end decisions on who to hire are a part of this generation and there seems to be something of a split attitude towards whether Gen Y or X are better candidates for the job.
Is Gen Y less hard working from lack of experience-and a lack of motivation from recent unemployment slumps? Possibly. Does Gen X have a better understanding and tolerance of business? Probably.
The two generations are now fighting alongside each other to either get onto that job ladder or get back onto it, and each industry will have a different view for what is best for their particular organisation.
Gen Y has had a rough time of late. Up against hundreds of other applicants, where competition is stiff. CVs and cover letters get swallowed up in the sea of ‘unsuccessful’ submissions just because of the sheer volume, which means they have to be nothing short of excellent to get through the first stage. Knowing someone is no longer a nice convenience but a desperate hope that perhaps a family member’s friend’s golfing partner might help you.
No wonder finance is so appealing. It’s welcomingly asking for graduates and young people to apply.
But what sectors like the finance sector are proving is that no matter how much of an influx of graduate schemes and junior level positions they are awarding to young people they are still one of the most willing industries in the UK to take a chance on Gen Y. They know they’re the future and that fresh, innovative minds are desperately needed to revitalise the wounded industry and empower the recruits who will one day make it to the top.
Tags: finance, Generation X, Generation Y, job, Robert Half, unemployment rate
